L03: Following Codes and Conventions

Throughout the pre-production and production of my magazine, the various issues of 'Tabletop Gaming' magazine has inspired some of my decisions. However, where this magazine uses images of TTRPG characters and environments to show the creativity of TTRPGs, I wanted to make my magazine feel more human and less intimidating in order to target newer TTRPG players. To do this, I used a medium close-up shot of Michael Hearne (a real TTRPG player) looking intrigued and excited by a minifigure. Furthermore, I took this photo at an eye-level angle as it connotes equality between the audience and Michael, it also presents Michael as an ideal self/ partner. Although it isn't relevant to the conventions of a magazine, the clothes that Michael is wearing on my front cover connote creativity and imagination which both reflect the conventions of TTRPGs.

My choice of house colours (Blue, Yellow and Red) are relatively similar to the 'Tabletop Gaming' magazine whose house colours are Orange, White and Black. The red and orange colours across both covers create a sense of adrenaline which reflects the dangerous adventure within TTRPGs. The use of the colour yellow connotes treasure which is common throughout the majority of TTRPGs. I differed from the traditional TTRPG magazine house colour conventions by using the colour blue. The reason for this is that blue is a friendly colour which has a connotation of stability and security.

Another difference in convention that I made is the font style. The Tabletop Gaming magazine uses all-caps for its puffs and coverlines. This comes across as visually noisy and intimidating, as my magazine is targeted towards new players, I opted for not using all-caps as it come across more calm and welcoming.

For the double page spread of my magazine, I also took inspiration from Tabletop Gaming magazine. The Tabletop Gaming magazine double page spread to the right uses a lot of angular shapes, to me this denotes dice, and this is a convention that I wanted to stick with. I also noticed from analysing this, and other TTRPG magazines, that they tend to use images of real TTRPGs and board games. Seen as a lot of my magazine intends to build community, I wanted to take a photo that showed a group of people playing a TTRPG together.

Every magazine double page spread that I found used black writing on a white background. I found that this wasn't very accessible, especially for dyslexic people. To amend this, I decided to ignore this convention and use a more parchment like colour. This would make my magazine more accessible, but it also suits the TTRPG genre more. 

Although it is not a convention of TTRPG genre magazines specifically, the majority of magazine double page spreads use 2 or three columns of text, allowing them to provide a lot more information. The purpose of this specific article (Tabletop Role-Play Games for Beginners) is to provide a brief insight into the very basics of TTRPGs, and to encourage people to play TTRPGs. To accomplish this, I have chosen to only use 1 column of text to make the page look less intimidating to beginners. If I was to produce the other articles in this magazine, I would use 2 columns on each page.

The contents page to the right is from the magazine, Retro Gamer.

I liked the layout of this contents page, as it manages to give you the title of each section along with a teaser of the contents of that section. For this page I mostly stuck to the conventions of relatively compact text and less images. Because my magazine is targeted towards a very niche audience, it has less articles and I would naturally need the text to be less compact, and I would need more space to be taken up with graphics such as puffs and images.

The main difference I made from the usual magazine conventions is how I showed the page numbers. I really wanted to sell the idea that this magazine is purely about TTRPGs, and the best way to do this was with the most well known part of any TTRPG, dice. So, I positioned the page numbers onto the sides of dice outlines.

L03: Setting up Adobe Photoshop Creative Cloud

 

The measurements I have used (2700px by 3510px) is the industry standard for the genre of magazine I am producing, furthermore, this will mean that The Adventurer's Guide magazine will be the same size as the competitor's magazines. 

I am also making the magazine using photoshop as it creates lossless file types and is suitable for high quality printing. This is why the resolution is set to 300.

L03: Body Copy for Articles

A Summary of TTRPGs

Key Terms:

DM/ GM - Dungeon Master/ Game Master

TTRPG - Tabletop Role Play Game

Party - The group of players

Setting - The world around you

What are TTRPGs?

TTRPGs, or Tabletop Role Play Games, are games that

run on different systems and leads a party through a setting

in which the party form a story with only their creativity. A

full game of a TTRPG is known as a campaign. These can

last for up to a few years, but are played in session of a

couple of hours at a time.

Where can I start playing TTRPGs
and which one should I start with?

The most well known and simplest TTRPG is Dungeons

and Dragons, commonly abbreviated to D&D. D&D

already has such a large player base which has a

reputation of welcoming nature.

Finding a group to begin playing TTRPGs with is

potentially the most challenging part of getting started.

If you don’t know anyone who knows any TTRPGs well

enough to run a game for you, we reccomend paying a 

visit to Patriot Games (More details on Pg. 23) as they

run a TTRPG night every tuesday at 6:30pm.

How much does it cost to start?

When starting playing any TTRPG, all you need is a set of

7 polyhedral dice, which can be bought from any games

shop, and a very vague understanding of what TTRPGs

are, and what purpose they serve.

Although, if you are willing to spend a bit more money, here

are some helpful pieces of equipment.

(This question is answered in more detail in the ‘Interview

With Elijah Mangnall’ section on pg.23)

Interview with Elijah Mangnall

Some of the equipment in TTRPGs can cost
a lot of money, how should a new player
start if they are on a budget?

While it is nice to have all the fancier equipment, making your own is a

lot cheaper and a lot more fun. When I started, we only had the books,

and while this did mean a lot of bodging distances on my end as the

DM, but I believe that it can be more fun that way.

What would you want people who are
thinking about getting into TTRPG’s to
know?

I was an awkward child and found that I struggled to make friends.

Once I discovered Dungeons and Dragons, I found that it allowed me

to spend more time with the friends that I did have, and it 

gave me this shared experience which created precious memories.

How long have you been playing TTRPGs?

I have been playing TTRPGs, Dungeons and Dragons specifically,

since I was 11. I began playing after one of my friends ran a game for

some of us. After this, I began teaching myself the 5e system. As I

taught myself, and my friends this system, we had some teething

troubles, in particular, spell slots.

L03: Creating Production Materials

Front Cover:

The front cover of a magazine is supposed to give connotations of the contents of the magazine through the design aspects. Considering that the genre of the 'Adventurer's Guide' magazine is Tabletop Role Play Games (TTRPG's) there are a lot of aspects that I can relate the designs to.

Asset 1 - Puffs

In order to instantly represent the theme of TTRPG's, I used the polygon shape tool to create a hexagonal shape for these puffs. In most TTRPG's, a hexagonal grid map is used to show the overall world that you are playing in, and as these puffs show the overall theme of the articles they are referring to, it seemed fitting.

The red and yellow colours were chosen to connote danger and treasure. The red colour connotes fire and risk which are very common themes in TTRPG's. The yellow colour represents treasure as it denotes the colour of gold.

Asset 2 - Special Content Puff

I wanted to create a puff that shows off any temporary content that is only available in the current issue of the magazine. I decided that the best way to do this would be with a puff that looked like a sticker that is peeling away as it give the connotation that the opportunity to gain access to the content is nearly gone. 

I created this shape using the circle tool, and then I copy and pasted on of the corners onto another layer and applied filters to it to change the angle of the shadow to make it look like it is peeling up.

Asset 3 - Name Banner:

I wanted to include a banner that states the name of the model on the main cover image, I didn't want it to be too intrusive, but I still wanted it to fit in with the theme of the rest of the assets. 

I decided on the shape of the end of a ribbon, so I created a red rectangle using the rectangle shape tool and an equilateral triangle, using the triangle shape tool, which I used as a marker to cut out the end of the rectangle. I then added a yellow stroke and reduced the opacity of the banner.

Contents Page

Asset 1 - Puffs

The puff shown to the right is mainly a copy of the one from the front cover. I have done this as these puffs refer to the main article of the magazine, and that article talks about a shop which would stock the 'Adventurer's Guide' magazine which could increase sales (and therefore readership and circulation too).

Throughout the planning and pre-production of this magazine I have tried to make the magazine appealing to beginners, and I wanted to solidify this by creating a puff that specifically talks about a players first session of Dungeons and Dragons. Furthermore, in order to make this section more appealing, I have used a picture of the player where he looks happy and calm.

Asset 2 - Grave Stone

With there being an article about 'Deaths of the month,' I wanted to create a graphic that teased this. 

To create this graphic, I used the shape tool to create a rectangle and a circle, positioned them together and flattened their layers. To get the grey colour, I applied a colour overlay.

I then created another rectangle which I coloured black and positioned underneath

I added the text using the text tool. After creating the text, I added some filters and effects.

Asset 3 - Page Numbers

The most well-known convention of TTRPG's are dice. I wanted to denote this through the way that I reference page numbers. To create these, I used the line tool to draw the shape of the dice, and then I added the appropriate number and edited the perspective of the numbers so that they looked like they were in-line with the side of the dice.

Double Page Spread

Asset 1 - Heading

To create this heading, I created a polygon using the shape tool, and adjusted it to the size of the page. I changed the colour of it to a dark blue, and then applied a yellow stroke.

Asset 2 - Patriot Games Puff

Creating this puff was mostly the same as creating the heading. I created an octagon using the shape tool and then sized it using the transform tool, and positioned it where I wanted it. I then imported the Patriot Games logo and used the magic wand tool to remove the white background. For the text, I simply typed it out and then positioned it into the octagon.

Asset 3 - Picture Puff

This asset was simple to make, I used the shape tool to create a square, and positioned the image inside. I removed any excess image using the rectangular marquee tool.

Asset 4 - Page Numbers

I created these page numbers in the same way that I did for the contents page; used the line tool to draw out the shape of the dice, Added the correct numbers and then changed the perspective and rotation in order to make the numbers look like they are on the side of the dice.

L03: Contact Sheet and Evaluation

Photoshoot 1 (28/02/23)

Model: Elijah Mangnall

The purpose of this photoshoot was to capture photos of the TTRPG expert, Elijah Mangnall. As this was also the first photoshoot of this magazine, we also used this as an opportunity to figure out which camera settings would work best in this location (as all other photoshoots would take place in the same location) and where in the room provided the best lighting. As Elijah's photos would only be appearing in puffs, I took the photos of him horizontally.

I also captured photos of him using the dice box and rolling dice, but these photos all turned out low quality so I will not be using them.

Out of all the photos, I think that, IMG_5356, IMG_5357, IMG_5362 and IMG_5355 turned out the best. For the use that they will serve in the magazine, I will be using IMG_5356 as it is, in my opinion, the highest quality photo and meets its purpose.

Photoshoot 2 (07/03/23)

Model: Michael Hearne

The purpose of this photoshoot was to capture some high quality photos of Michael Hearne, who will be featured on the front cover of the magazine.

As the last photoshoot (with Elijah Mangnall) was partially used to test the lighting and settings, not much testing was needed during this photoshoot. 

With these photos being used for the front cover, they were all taken vertically to make the image fit on the front cover without any cropping or resizing.

Although the majority of these photos turned out well, my favourites are, IMG_5442, IMG_5443 and IMG_5449. In the end, I chose to use IMG_5443.

Photoshoot 3 (26/04/23)

Models: Elijah Mangnall, Nicolae Alexander, Benjamin Rounce, Jonathan Priest, Declan Labham, Joshua Bellamy

With these images, I wanted to show the community aspect of TTRPGs, and to represent the welcoming nature of those who already play TTRPGs.

These photos will be used in puffs and horizontally on the contents page, so I took these photos horizontally. Nearly all of these photos turned out well, and they are high quality.

With a lot of careful consideration, I have narrowed this selection down to 2 photos:

IMG_7248 and IMG_7179.

IMG_7248 will be used for the top of the contents page, whereas IMG_7179 will be used within a puff on the contents page.

L02: Gaining Permissions

Location Permission Form:

Photoshoot 1 (Elijah Mangnall - TTRPG Expert):

Photoshoot 2 (Michael Hearne):

Photoshoot 3 (Dungeons and Dragons Photoshoot):

L02: Questions for Interview

Interview with Tabletop Role Play Game Expert (Elijah Mangnall):

1) How did you get into TTRPGs?

Over the internet, consequence of what he read growing up, he always liked fantasy books, the idea of being in another world where you can be anyone/ do anything. The Disc World (about 40 books). Introduced this idea to his friends, they played tyranny of dragons. 

"The Discworld in particular stood out to me, it follows separate characters who all undergo a lot of growth as people, over these books and years in-universe. In hindsight, I see how similar this is to a campaign."

He always fancied himself as a bit of a writer, and liked the idea of creating his own worlds and stories.

2) How long have you been playing TTRPGs for?

Since he was about 11 (5 years). before buying any equipment, one of his friends ran a game. After this, he decided to learn the D&D system (5e). He bought himself the PHB and DMG to do so. With this he began running tyranny of dragons and introduced his friends to this as well.

"We had quite a few teething troubles as I taught them (and myself) the system. In particular, spell slots gave us trouble."

3) What made you start playing TTRPGs?

The idea that it is a way to play games with his friends. He was an awkward child and struggled to make friends, D&D allowed him to spend more time with his friends. He had to DM for a while as none of his friends knew how to DM as he introduced them to it. That shared experience was quite precious memories.

"I fondly remember the time they convinced me to let them kill another PC and stuff him in a box."

4) What about TTRPGs make them interesting and fun to you?

TTRPG's allow you to connect with the characters and NPCs and to have an impact on the world you are in (negative and positivity). The flexibility of the system in TTRPGs allows you to bring the fun into so many different settings (whether this is the world it is in or the scenario you are in). The idea of agency is incredibly important to me as it makes the story so much  more engaging.

5) As an expert, what would you want people who are thinking about getting into TTRPGs to know?

It is a good way to spend time with your friends, it doesnt require much. Depending on which TTRPG you are going into, it can cost a lot of money. It is good to be able to sit down and share an experience.

Don't rely solely on the books, it can be fun to make up a lot of stuff as you go along. Anyone who loves any type of story will have a TTRPG that works for them.

6) What are your future plans/ expectations of your TTRPG journey?

I would like to finish a campaign due to the length of campaigns. I have never been able to complete a full campaign. (Tell a full story around a character). More long term, I would like to get back into DMing, I have been doing it for my family, and I want to do it more. 

DMing is more of an art form.

I am quite excited to see what is going to happen with OneD&D. It seems like it would be worth a read to expand my horizons and see how different systems are run.

7) With the new edition of D&D around the corner, what new features are you excited for, and are there any features/ changes that you hope will be made?

As the lead designers of the materials have acknowledged that the PHB and The MM had a lot more money thrown at them, they were designed to be more user friendly. They are better formatted than the DMs guide as more people use them. Jeremy Crawford (source him on this) did an interview where he said that less money was being put into the DMs guide as it is difficult to give someone a guide onto how to run your own world. They never feel like they bring it together into one cohesive whole, they never give you those synaptic links that help you run it.

It will be interesting to see how the changes are made. Some of the classes need rebalancing. I want to see how the community interact with the changes made and how exploitable the changes are, and see how they are balanced. I like to take the changes and 'snap them in two.' 

It is possible to have infinite spell slots if you build a Warlock in the right way (in 5e) if you know how to exploit the system correctly. This is known as a coffee lock. By going 3 levels into the warlock class and at least 2 levels into sorcerer, someone can convert their warlock spell slots into sorcerer points then using a sorcerer feature, you can convert these into temporary spell slots which reset on a long rest. As long as you never take a long rest, you can continue building these up by reseting your warlock spell slots with short rests.

It will also be interesting to see how the feel of the system changes, but in the way that things are run, you can get a feel of how it works. I want to see if they tilt it into any different scenarios. "swords and sorcery"

"It's a great feeling, to make an absolutely broken character that only just works. Technically correct is the best kind of correct."

8) TTRPGs can cost a lot of money to get into and to buy all of the equipment for, how should a new player start if they are on a budget?

When I started playing with my group, we only had the books. While it is nice to have all the fancier equipment, making your own equipment is a lot cheaper and more fun. 'Theatre of the mind.' you can get by with some pieces of paper. As nice as it is to have a figurine of having your wizard character in the midst of casting a spell, a piece of paper with a rough sketch drawn on them. 

The internet is always your friend as people will have released beginner guides in order to help newer people. There are a lot of free resources.

"It did mean a lot of bodging distances on my end as a DM, but I believe it can be more fun that way."